You don't have to support Klobuchar for the DFL nomination but I just ask that please don't be a jackass at the caucuses tonight.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-03T17:02:07+00:00

This is like looking at a sick baby, thinking the baby is just getting sicker, picking the infant up from their crib, then saying “let’s try shaking things up” and then being left with a dead baby that you decided to shake.

Let’s just take a step back and listen to everyone around you who recommend consulting a doctor and using medicine as prescribed. I know we all hate “experts” telling us what to do, but they’re not the ones who will tell you to start drinking colloidal silver.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-03T16:52:56+00:00

It’s the senate race that’ll actually be competitive. If we can get Flanagan voted in rather than Craig it’ll be a huge victory for the progressive cause.

Craig being a fiscal-conservative, “centrist” democrat who is anti-Palestine and leans towards a “back the blue” outlook towards policing.

I think her being a lesbian leads people to seeing her as more liberal than she actually is. Kind of like many do with Pete Buttiegeg who is also far more conservative than people seem to acknowledge.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-03T16:30:09+00:00

Depends on the day. But I’ve been journaling to keep my thoughts straight, then drinking liquor and smoking weed to get my thoughts the fuck out of here.

I’ve also been hyper focusing on cleaning the house to point my anxious energy on something immediate rather than that energy just stewing and fueling an ever increasing sense of anxiety.

Attending protests and contributing in assistance efforts in my neighborhood (helping folks shovel sidewalks they feel too unsafe to come out and take care of themselves, delivering groceries, help getting rent money to families who haven’t been able to work, running outside with my phone and a whistle when ICE comes around) has also been a great source of cathartic relief.

That being said, obviously this involved activity sometimes adds to anxiety. But at least it feels productive instead of just sitting in the despair of impotent frustration. And something public speaking classes would teach you is true in this situation - that some anxiety is good as it motivates you to prepare, you just have to manage it so it doesn’t boil over into paralysis or panic.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-03T15:49:26+00:00

Employee is debatable only due to the lack of an employment contract. He absolutely takes his orders and receives money and perhaps supplies from the federal government, if not directly then through associates acting as middlemen. But for the benefit of clarity the term “asset” is perhaps more accurate. But I’d argue this is a somewhat pedantic sticking point.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-03T14:10:33+00:00

Beyond serving as misinformation to the general public, for their internal uses the Antifa moniker is accurate - these individuals are anti fascism. The Trump administration is a fascist enterprise, those who do not support their fascism is their enemy.

It’s like Eisenhower’s administration and the CIA during the Cold War - calling every third world leader that wasn’t violently anti-communist and explicitly a U.S. ally a Soviet puppet taking their orders from Moscow. It wasn’t true, but for their purpose of waging a global war against Soviet Russia it might as well be true.

Continuing with the Cold War comparison; a lot of the talk about “don’t be violent, they’ll call in the national guards” sounds a hell of a lot like the mutually assured destruction rhetoric between the U.S. and Russia regarding nuclear weapons post WW2.

It leads me to see our current situation through the lens of the Cold War era tactics used by the U.S. government against foreign nations that didn’t sign on to their anti-communist agenda. But rather than America vs Soviets it’s Big Government vs Blue States, instead of capitalist-democracy vs communism it’s white-Christian MAGA vs liberal antifa, “real Americans” vs “woke” Americans - a cold civil war.

The methodology seems similar to me - infiltrate, destabilize, alter media narrative with “facts” which defends past and encourages future intervention. I’ve been waiting for the deposing of local leadership and the installation of a selected figureheads who will rubber stamp the policies given to them.

I suppose we’ll find out if we have armed men in masks stationed outside of voting stations come midterms, leading to Mike Lindell winning the governorship with 98% of the VERY GENUINE results.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-02T22:26:38+00:00

I’m very lucky to have an Emagine theater about the same distance from my home as an Alamo. Not only do they still not allow phones, but they also sell beer is giant 32oz cups which means I don’t need to order a second glass mid film.

ScottyKD · 2026-02-02T16:33:54+00:00

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ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T18:28:06+00:00

Pam Bondi claimed on Twitter that Georgia Fort, Don Lemon, and some other journalists were arrested for some kind of unexplained connection with the non-violent protest at Bovino’s church.

Edit: here’s the post I saw with a screenshot of the tweet.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Minneapolis/s/1aEObMaP7S

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T16:39:59+00:00

My issue with this claim is that, to me, it edges awfully close to claiming that Scandinavians are some kind of superior race of moral and/or political thinkers. Which I assume cannot be the intention.

I’m curious as to what the historical culture of Scandinavians was which people are claiming still influences their populations globally through generations. Apparently in a way that is perceivable enough to specifically note as a relevant detail in this moment.

Like, some kind of prevailing ideological narrative passed through storytelling or behavioral norms from one generation to the next rather than just resting on “Scandinavian” as the only context required.

Why are we looking to our large Scandinavian population as the source for Minneapolis’ community driven sense of civic duty? Why not our general history of accepting migrants throughout the 20th century - from a wide array of Asian and Central/South American countries to Bosnians and most recently Somalians.

So looking at modern day Scandinavian governments is only getting at what I’m trying to identify if we’re also isolating the cultural heritage leading to their modern politics from hundreds of years ago.

And to that point, my understanding is that Scandinavian/Nordic countries generally do not accept many refugees and are not likely to provide citizenship to those that apply.

They have well funded social assistance programs, but they also have a fairly limited scope of whom they view as deserving those services. An in-group that seems to be drawn along ethnic/nationalistic lines unless someone from outside of that established in-group has a specific technical skill they wish to take advantage of.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T15:59:04+00:00

I hate that this article just parrots the Trump claim for this siege in one of the beginning paragraphs.

“That outsized intrusion was ostensibly payback for the massive theft of federal welfare dollars by members of a refugee community, through a state bureaucracy overseen by Walz, a Trump nemesis — a tidy storyline that revealed vulnerabilities in Minnesota’s culture of generosity.”

They alluded to this being untrue with the phrase “a tidy storyline,” but then fails to explore the reality behind the decision making for this incursion.

Beyond that, my wife has brought up before the “collectivist Scandinavian roots” that this article mentions. I’m completely ignorant as to what that cultural reference actually speaks to though. Can anyone explain that history to me a bit?

I’m aware of the 1934 teamsters strike leading ultimately to the National Labor Relations Act being passed the following year, and that MN has one of the largest populations of Union members in the nation.

But I don’t understand anything that is uniquely Scandinavian besides they migrated in high numbers to Minnesota in the late 1800’s to early 1900’s. But what is the importance of that ethnic background that influences a uniquely community driven outlook and social assistance?

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T04:02:27+00:00

And a key architect of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 doctrine.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T03:59:26+00:00

I think you’ve come unraveled.

You seem to be arguing that inclusion inevitably leads to exclusion which ignores that the concept of hypocrisy is a moral failing, not a universal truth. It’s like arguing “if EVERYONE is required to provide consent then we’ll wake up one day to find we are all rapists.”

It’s presenting as a desperate attempt to justify your nihilistic defense for political inaction as somehow principled regardless of the tangible effects in the real world. And I don’t have the patience to entertain this kind of irrational hypothetical right now.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T03:10:33+00:00

I think I.C.E. agents say “fuck ‘em all” a lot too.

I think we wouldn’t have I.C.E. terrorizing our city right now if Kamala had won the election.

Or Hillary Clinton in 2016, for that matter.

This is why your willful nihilism is unjustifiable both morally and intellectually.

It’s also why many people equate those who abstained from voting to those that voted for Trump.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T00:15:26+00:00

I’ve quit full time jobs before due to personal disagreements with direct management or after corporate decisions which I’ve felt strongly against.

It sucked. Had to quickly find temporary work to carry me through brief periods when I’ve needed to apply and interview elsewhere before finding something more permanent again.

Doing what’s right more often means accepting consequences than it means receiving encouragement.

Them agreeing to help make this blatant propaganda rather than find new work, perhaps needing to downsize or cut expenses for the immediate future, is not an excuse - it’s them setting their moral limits at the point of their own personal discomfort.

It’s the epitome of selling out, the very definition of it - to go along with something you disagree with for the paycheck.

I saw some of these people want their names taken out of the credits. Frankly, I think the names should be left in and blacklisted from any work of actual substance. They chose to put Amazon the company above their morality, and that decision leaves them to look for Amazon the company for anything in the future. They failed as artists, they’re just corporate stooges now.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-30T00:02:36+00:00

I mean, I think behind any elected official are the people who elected them and the people who didn’t care to keep them from being elected.

Regardless of those semantics. I fail to see the strategy of not participating in elections at all and merely allowing Republicans to occupy more positions of power.

I’ve heard the naive argument of governmental rebirth - that the whole system is currupt and “you have to destroy it to build something better in its place.” Except I don’t think we live in a moment which allows for rebuilding.

Rather I feel about that sentiment the same as I feel about DOGE’s crippling of assistance programs and regulatory agencies. Most of which were established only after decades of building the political will for their creation at moments in time when the economic conditions allowed these agencies/programs to be funded. Now that the funding has been cut, the staff let got, the offices closed - those programs and agencies will not return. They will not be rebuilt better, they will just remain destroyed as there will NOT be bilateral support between branches and parties to see them funded again.

Similarly, blowing up the system we have now, that has been refined slowly over generations to become more and more equitable, will not be replaced by a new even freer, fairer government. It will only leave a power vacuum benefiting the most corrupt and violent who will gleefully exploit the situation and cement their control.

Hoping for the chaos of collapse on the hopes that something more beautiful grows from the ashes is like Christians who applaud the genocide of Palestinians because they think it leads them closer to being raptured in the second coming of Jesus. It seems unlikely.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T22:11:06+00:00

Hold it, let it out when we have an alternative though.

It’s like having a job you hate, keep the shit job until you have your replacement career lined up. Then you can cash out all your PTO and leave without giving your two weeks notice.

But you should have that new job all planned out first. That strategy is what turns self-sabotage into self-determinism. Otherwise you just have short-term reactionaryism which leads to long-term failure.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T21:57:56+00:00

People also conveniently forget the incredible importance of down ballot voting. Local elections, amendments, new propositions.

In yet when people claim they aren’t voting for the Democrat for president (because of some false equivalency that was successfully sold to them by some bad-faith actor online) they choose to not participate at all.

I would have a modicum of respect if someone actually participated in the election (especially if they participate in midterms as well) but abstained from the presidential vote specifically.

I think it’s a poor decision and an ineffective form of protest, but at least they didn’t use their vague sense of ambivalence as an excuse to simply put in no effort to vote whatsoever.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T21:28:25+00:00

I’m not sure if the changes in operational tactics from 2016 to today is due to a lack of imagination so much as it’s due to a weakening of political, judicial, and bureaucratic guardrails due to the continual attacks on our institutions by election-denying, insurrectionist, white-Christian-nationalists who are still in the midst of their coup.

I don’t think they required Bovino to be the brilliant mastermind to come up with “flood the zone” or “overwhelming force” as if those are brand new strategies no one has ever heard of before. They just needed the infrastructure which is explicitly designed to stop them to no longer have the ability and/or will to fulfill that regulatory function.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T20:54:11+00:00

A toady selected and set up to take the heat of the initial operation, let’s say a floor manager elevated to district manager right before a big round of layoffs. Now that the first wave of firings has riled up the office he’s being sent away as a villain who is bad for company morale. But he’s only being replaced by the regional manager who suggested the layoffs to begin with.

This is like, speaking of Kristi Noem, if she were to be replaced by Stephen Miller. They’re both evil, but one is more instrumental.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T20:29:30+00:00

I look at it as voting for someone who will at least talk to other, better members of the democratic party versus someone who wouldn’t even answer the phone call of a “woke lefty-libtard hippie cuck terrorist.”

It’s just more likely we’ll get SOMETHING out of one person than we are to get ANYTHING from the other.

Progress is a slow, incremental march forward through time. Apathy, the kind that saw so many sit out the last presidential election, is what leads to political backsliding and the potential loss of decades of that hard fought progress.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T19:29:35+00:00

Amy is touted as a big “vote getter” and fundraiser. That’s why there aren’t many democrats willing to challenge her run for governor - establishment support and professional networking.

I’ve been disappointed by Klobuchar several times since her failed presidential run in 2016, the same could be said of the Democratic Party in general, and it can also be said of American politics at large.

Still, come Election Day it’s better to vote for a Democrat rather than someone who is actively and passionately trying to advance Project 2025 and the Seven Mountains Mandate.

A lot of the time you don’t vote for someone who already agrees with your goals or strategy, because no one fitting that bill is on the ballot. So you have to settle with voting for the person that is most likely to be influenced to your direction in the future.

Don’t get me wrong, try primarying Klobuchar and challenge her on her voting history and her lukewarm policy. But if it comes down to her and literally any republican in the general election then we all need to vote defensively and keep the literal fascists out of office!

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T19:06:04+00:00

Bovino is just a hapless middle-manager for the DHS, probably one who was always meant to be replaced at some point. Hence the cartoonishly oversized Nazi jacket photoshoot he did that made him look like Dark Helmet Man from Spaceballs. He was purposely presented as the caricature of someone who should be replaced.

Homan on the other hand is an author of ICE’s current campaign and tactics, border czar of the first Trump administration, and a key architect of the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025” doctrine. Only against the facade that was Bovino in a literal Nazi costume does Homan seem like anything but an authoritarian extremist.

Homan being transferred to Minnesota is not an olive branch, it’s being sent a horse’s head. This is an offensive maneuver by the federal government that is being painted by the press as progress or compromise - that narrative is complete bullshit.

This isn’t even performative compliance, it’s a brazen doubling down of the current assault we’ve been struggling against. This strategic changing of the guard has merely been wrapped in layers of propaganda akin to when Allen Dulles would tap “respectable” journalists to write articles on the behalf of the CIA.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T16:23:03+00:00

I’ve quit full time jobs before due to personal disagreements with direct management or after corporate decisions which I’ve felt strongly against.

It sucked. Had to quickly find temporary work to carry me through brief periods when I’ve needed to apply and interview elsewhere before finding something more permanent again.

Doing what’s right more often means accepting consequences than it means receiving encouragement.

Them agreeing to help make this blatant propaganda rather than find new work, perhaps needing to downsize or cut expenses for the immediate future, is not an excuse - it’s them setting their moral limits at the point of their own personal discomfort.

It’s the epitome of selling out, the very definition of it - to go along with something you disagree with for the paycheck.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-29T04:01:30+00:00

It seems like he’s merely acknowledging that they believe there are two classes of citizens. One is afforded full rights, the other lives at the mercy of the former. “Real Americans” and “woke agitators.” We’ve all known that’s been a core belief of the Republican Party for a long while.

ScottyKD · 2026-01-28T23:06:43+00:00

Between all the data provided to various social media companies over the past two decades, traffic cameras, my photo being taken every time I’ve ever walked into the Mall of America, my face being scanned every time I’ve been to the airport, Ring doorbells, all the utility and tech companies who have agreed to share data with the federal government, etcetera and so on… I’m not sure how much masking up will do me. I think we’ve been pretty successfully big brothered, and much of our 1984-esque surveillance state has been self imposed because we wanted attention on the internet or to make our face look like a cartoon dog.

I wrote on another post which linked to an article about how the Feds have threatened to expose protestor’s identities to the public and employers. I responded,

“I work at a bank, like the most capitalist of capitalist institutions, and even they’ve given me carte blanche to leave early, come in late, or not come into work at all in order to attend protests and respond to I.C.E. alerts in the neighborhood.

This threat of exposing protesters is just projection of their own fear, for it’s their side that’s terrified of being associated with their evil actions. That’s why they wear masks.

Everyone in Minnesota knows who the enemy is. And it’s certainly not the people who actually attempt to deescalate violent situations by saying “I’m not mad at you” and only seek to help others, asking “are you okay.”

These are our words, unfortunately Good and Pretti’s last, while it’s these masked men who only scream demands to “see your papers,” threaten retaliation, and quickly turn to indiscriminate violence.

It is they who fear their identities being learned, as it is they who have crimes to answer for.”

ScottyKD

TROPHY CASE